Teacher shuffling by Columbus schools upsets parents

Friday

Mar 2, 2012 at 12:01 AMMar 2, 2012 at 9:29 AM

The Columbus school district is changing its gifted and talented programs, and also shifting about 160 math and science teaching positions to reading jobs. The district on Tuesday notified a group of teachers who work with gifted students and the 160 specialists who worked to improve students' understanding of math and science that their positions would be "staff reduced" at the end of the school year. The teachers aren't being laid off, but they will have to apply for another job within the district.

Jennifer Smith Richards, The Columbus Dispatch

The Columbus school district is changing its gifted and talented programs, and also shifting about 160 math and science teaching positions to reading jobs.

The district on Tuesday notified a group of teachers who work with gifted students and the 160 specialists who worked to improve students’ understanding of math and science that their positions would be “staff reduced” at the end of the school year. The teachers aren’t being laid off, but they will have to apply for another job within the district.

The “staff reductions” are not aimed at “reducing our work force,” said district spokesman Jeff Warner. “We’re just reallocating resources.”

However, there will be 60 fewer teaching positions to fill next school year because of expected enrollment declines. But 180 current teachers are expected to retire, meaning the district will probably end up hiring new teachers, Warner said.

He called the changes to the district’s gifted-education programs an expansion. “We’re not abandoning gifted,” he said.

Instead of pulling students into special classrooms to receive gifted services, teachers for those students will work in regular classrooms and be able to offer help in more subjects. Gifted teachers also will work in grades one through eight instead of grades four through seven, he said.

But parent Elizabeth Hewitt said, “They’re not coming clean on what they’re really doing, which is effectively increasing the number of students per teacher.” Hewitt has a fourth-grade son at Ecole Kenwood French Immersion School.

“It’s going to water down the program,” said Natali Fausey, who has three children at Ecole Kenwood.

Warner couldn’t give numbers on how many gifted teachers will see their assignments change next school year. The changes to the programs were described as a “win-win for all involved” in an email from Toia Robinson, who supervises the district’s programs for gifted students, to a parent group that advocates for gifted Columbus students.

But Hewitt said, “I just don’t see in any way how this is a win-win situation. I felt incredibly patronized.”

Julie Harris, who has a daughter in the fourth grade at Indian Springs Elementary in Clintonville, said she’s upset that the district is reassigning its math and science teachers. Her daughter’s confidence in math and science has shot up since working in the specialized setting.

“She understands things that she never understood before, and I’ve heard that from other parents,” Harris said. “It makes no sense to me. I keep hearing how important math and science is."

The changes coincide with the district’s annual “staff reduction” process. First-year teachers and those who haven’t been working in their schools for long always are staff-reduced and required to reapply for jobs for the next school year.

Five years ago, the district cut its reading specialist jobs in favor of math and science specialists, a move criticized by reading groups and by Rhonda Johnson, president of the Columbus Education Association, the teachers union.

Johnson said yesterday that the switch back had to be made because students were struggling with literacy.

“I think (the district) understands that this is what’s going to help kids pass the tests. They can’t read them. I’m not talking about culling words; I’m talking about comprehension,” Johnson said.

jsmithrichards@dispatch.com

bbush@dispatch.com

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